The invention relates to an apparatus for transporting packaging material, especially reels of web-shaped packaging material, from a stock to at least one reception station, especially in the region of a packaging machine, with material conveyors which are movable along a conveyor track (rail line) extending above the packaging machines.
For the feeding of high-performance cigarette-packaging machines or so-called lines consisting of several packaging machines one following the other and performing different functions, there has already been proposed a conveying system for the packaging material, in which web-shaped packaging material in the form of reels is fed to the individual consumption points in the region of the packaging machines by a circular conveyor with a plurality of rotating supporting members, each receiving a reel. The reels are conveyed up to the circular track in the region of a loading station by a feed conveyor and are taken over automatically by reel carriers. The reels are taken over in reverse order in the region of the packaging machine by a discharge conveyor. For receiving the reels during transport, the rotating conveyor members are equipped with a supporting journal which enters a central orifice in the reel. The supporting journal is mounted on a supporting arm rotatable about a vertical axis (DE-A-3,632,237 corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 4,907,689 issued Mar. 13, 1990).